No Day But Today
by Antigone2
Summary: A retelling of the Promise Ring episode, from Mamoru's POV. ; It's so sappy but... if you that's your thing, please read and reveiw.


AN.  
Hola minna-san! Gosh, long time no see...I'm sorry... ;; I'm also sorry about   
this fic. It's an R break-up, like we don't have *enough* of them floating   
around... but I thought I'd um... join in the fun! Or something.   
  
  
Disclaimer:  
RENT and all its wonderful characters (Angel!) belong to the late Jonathan   
Larson. Sailormoon belongs to Naoko Takeuchi. Both genius in their time.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
No Day But Today   
by Antigone 2000  
  
"Who do you think you are?  
Little girl, hey, the door is that way.  
You better go, you know the fire is out anyway.  
....  
A heart can freeze.   
Or it can burn.  
My pain will ease, if I can learn:  
There is no future.   
There is no past.  
I live this moment   
As my last  
....  
Long ago you might've light up my heart  
But the fire is dead   
And never ever gonna start  
....  
There's only yes  
Only tonight  
We must let go  
To know what's right  
  
I trust my soul  
....  
Who says that there's a soul?  
....  
My only goal, is just to be  
...  
Just let me be!!  
....  
There's only here.  
Give in to love,   
Or live in fear  
No other path  
...  
Come back another day  
....  
No other way  
....  
Come back another day  
....  
No day but today  
....  
Another day  
....  
No day but today"  
  
- Another Day, RENT  
~~  
[[Usagi pounds at Mamoru's door. He tries to get her to leave, until she  
mentions the dream, which startles him.   
Outside the building, Luna and Chibi-Usa wait. Upstairs, Mamoru has let  
Usagi in, but is not looking at her. She knows now that Mamoru has had the  
same dream and that he turned away from her because he was afraid for her,  
and tries to tell him it doesn't mean anything. But Mamoru says he's had the  
dream so many times he's begun to believe it wasn't a dream but a prediction  
of the future.   
  
Usagi doesn't care about any danger if they can be together, but Mamoru says  
they can't be together, and he pushes her out the door. She hammers at the  
door, crying that even if the world was destroyed she'd want to be with him,  
until she falls to the floor, sobbing. Mamoru stands against the door  
inside.]]  
  
-From Hitoshi Doi's site, episode 77: "Omoiha onaji! Usagi to Mamoru no ai  
futatabi!"  
~~  
  
It's dark but I don't turn on any lights. The moonlight is a sickly  
sort of weak glow, which does less to illuminate and more to make shadows  
across the empty, solemn room.  
  
Leaning against the door, unmoving in some sort of masochistic trance, I  
listen to her. Every muffled sob stabs through my ears and the oppressive  
silence of the apartment building. Detached, I feel the dull throbbing in my  
heart as if it belongs to someone else. I am not used to love, I was  
unprepared for this. Utterly and completely unprepared.  
  
She is weakened, exhausted from crying, sobbing, and begging with every  
fiber of her being for me to understand. She knows now, my reasons... my  
justified, sensible reasons and, therefore, logical and necessary actions.   
  
And she doesn't care.   
  
Of course Tsukino Usagi doesn't care what happens to her in some far,  
foggy future. The girl lives in some sort of eternal present that keeps  
horrors of the past from haunting her dreams, and fears of what is to come  
from waking her at night. I envy her that, but I can never understand it.   
There are so many, many things I can never understand about Usako. No,  
Usagi. Her name is just Usagi now, although she still calls me 'Mamo-chan'.   
I assume that will end soon enough, once she sees I am serious. Funny, what  
will she call me then? Again, that strange feeling of detachment, as I  
wonder with morbid curiosity how much it will hurt to hear her say  
'Mamoru-san'.  
  
She pounds on the door, little fists shaking the frame, and I tiredly  
sink the floor. I will not allow her back into my life. I cannot, for I  
fear I will never be able to give her up, will endanger her future by a  
fierce possessiveness that rides barely under the surface, frightening me  
with its sudden surges when I least expect it. So I do not open the door.  
  
But I will not move from it either. I will not drown out her cries and  
I will not leave her. She mourns openly, tearing at both our souls, and I  
mourn with her. Tonight, we cry together, the closest we've been to each  
other in months; mere inches of paint and wood separating us. Mere inches  
and so much more.   
  
I lean against the solid door, wishing for an insane  
moment it would melt away, and I would find her in my arms, sobbing into my  
shirt as I comforted her. Her tears would dampen my shirt while yards of  
butter-yellow hair would tickle my face as I tried to brush it back so I  
could see her, talk to her. Her arms would crush me nearly painfully to her  
as they had so many times before. I shut my eyes, scared by the sudden  
desire a simple memory could conjure.  
  
  
It was only a short time ago she stood before me, eyes shining up with  
her amazing everlasting hope, after pounding on the door with tiny and  
deceptively strong fists.   
  
"Mamo-chan! Mamo-chan!" I did not want her here, waking the neighbors  
and weakening my door's hinges and my resolve. But I did so love to hear her  
calling me, her voice is as full of love as it was before I broke her heart.   
Could that be possible for anyone but her?  
  
"What do you want?" It was not difficult to make my voice angry and  
cold, I am so filled with loathing for myself, "You are really making a  
scene."  
  
Blue eyes didn't even waver at my harsh words, and she stubbornly stood  
there, breathlessly telling asking me to hear her out. She must know how  
gorgeous she is. Why was she doing this to me?  
  
Again, I pushed her away, started to slam the door against her cries,  
when something she said caught my ears.  
  
"Have you been having a strange dream, too?"   
  
I couldn't help but startle enough to allow myself to meet her eyes, and  
as always I am lost. I let her in.  
  
Standing in my shadowed hallway, I refused to even say one kind word to  
her, to look at her. Her sweet, precious voice tripped from her lips  
quickly, desperately trying to convince me that this doesn't matter. It's  
just a dream.  
  
I snapped and raised my voice to her, forcing logic Tsukino Usagi would  
never accept upon her. How dare she stand there, my entire world in one  
small teenage girl, and tell me innocently that her life did not matter!   
  
"I don't care as long as I'm with you," she cried.  
  
I slammed the door.  
  
"Mamo-chan! Mamo-chan! Onegai, Mamo-chan!"  
  
  
  
Her crying has slowed from desperate, heaving sobs to the reluctant  
hiccups of a calming child, and I hear a soft, shuddering sigh as she drags  
herself to her feet.   
  
I know she is leaving, the minutes have stretched by slowly like the  
shadows thrown around my living room, and it is late. I can't hear it, but I  
can imagine her soft small hands futilely rubbing the salty tears off her  
flushed, damp face. Her eyes are probably bloodshot, her bangs and soft  
ringlets of golden hair by her ears are soaked with tears, her entire little  
body trembling. I can see her in my mind; disheveled and heartbroken, and  
yet still so heartwrenchingly beautiful.   
  
"Mamo-chan?"  
  
My only reaction to her shaking voice calling softly to me, one more  
time, is to lower my head to my arms and shut my eyes tightly. 'Please,' I  
beg silently, 'please go away. Leave me alone. This is my pain. You need  
to--' To what? Get on with her life? Forget me? It is what I deserve.   
It's is a punishment I should take ten times over to pay for the selfish,  
childish fear that swirls in my stomach at the thought of being forgotten.   
At the thought of Usak--Usagi with anyone else. But what do I want? Her  
dream is to be a bride, and she can never be mine. I'd give up my world for  
her in an instant, I did just that, actually, on a cold day months ago. But  
I don't expect her to give up all her dreams for me. I don't want her to.   
At least, I shouldn't.  
  
"Mamo-chan?" Softer now. How does she know I am still here, just  
behind the door, listening for her?   
  
I turn, and for a moment a rebellious hand falls to the doorknob, just  
barely grazing the cold metal. Time seems to freeze.   
  
She sighs, and I am terrified at how defeated she sounds. I press my  
hand to the door, and I know, somehow, that on the other side she has done  
the same. But I don't speak. She has my answer, I can't take it back now.  
  
"Sayonara," her voice as the strange jumpy quality of someone fighting  
tears as hard as they can, "Mamoru-san."   
  
I don't remember my knees giving out from under me, I don't remember  
how long I sat, unmoving on my floor. Blindly, I grasp at the only thought  
that penetrated my shocked interior. 'Oh god, I did not think it would hurt  
quite this much.'   
  
And something inside me broke. I want my Usako to be here. Now. So  
very badly.  
  
My ears burning with the sound of the four syllables that shattered my  
heart, I stumble up and throw open the door.   
  
"U-Usa-" I choke on the name, but she is gone, the hall is empty.  
  
I am no longer Mamo-chan.  
  
  
What will happen when the finality of what had happened sunk in  
completely? Little things; I will no longer be close enough to see the tiny  
gold accents visible deep in her blue eyes, never be able to brush wayward  
wisps and curls back from her face. She will never smile at me again, never  
kiss me again, and never hold me ever again.   
Alone, I can still almost hear her:  
  
"If the world ends, I don't care" even though there may be no tomorrow,  
"as long as we are together," share today with me. Just today. Just  
tonight. Just you. Just me.  
  
I can't give her forever. And she does not deserve any less than that.   
The angel crowned with the sun, blessed with the blue of the sky in her eyes,  
the warmth of summer in her breath. I could not even give her tonight.   
  
What is the use of today if you cannot have a tomorrow? My whole life I  
have been a child without a past, and now Usako confessed through tears that  
she would not mind being a child without a future. So all we really have is  
now.   
  
"What if you could freeze 'right now'?" Usako said that, a while ago,  
one perfect summer evening, swinging her feet off the bench we sat on and  
leaning her head on my arm, "Like a photograph, you couldn't see what was  
outside the frame. You couldn't see an hour ago, or an hour from now, just  
right now."  
  
I remember not being sure what to say so I just shrugged, or made some  
non-committal sound.  
  
She had giggled and shook her head, "I guess that didn't make much  
sense. I love you, Mamo-chan." Usako added, I think so that if someone was  
'freezing right now' she would be sure to have that on the record.  
  
She never did make much sense. But my tortured mind is screaming at me,  
that if someone froze right now, froze today and just looked at it, what  
would they see? They would never know the Moon Kingdom, nor the impending  
destruction of the world. But they would see Usako crying, my heart  
breaking. They would hear the echo of Usako, Usagi's, "Sayonara,  
Mamoru-san."  
  
As much as she holds me in awe, I am not like Usagi. I  
never will be. I am always thinking of the future. I cannot be like her and  
live just for today.   
  
But I can *give* her today.   
  
Rushing to the window, I press my fist against it, over my head and stare at  
the moon.  
  
'What should I do?' Shutting my eyes, I pray for a sign. Any sign.   
  
Anything.  
  
The feeling of Sailormoon transforming washes over me like the moonlight,  
peeking all my senses.  
  
Good enough.   
  
Maybe I am desperate, but as I rush to the scene of the youma attack I  
can't help but pray to whoever sent the sign that perhaps I have a chance to  
be Mamo-chan again.  
  
  
~~  
  
  
Yes, my speech was about the future. Little Chibi-Usa is from a world  
that needs help. Perhaps it is a world in which Usagi and I do not exist,  
but it is what we need to fight for. Fight for the future. Live for today.   
Neither of us can do both alone, but together...  
  
The night has gotten colder, December winds tug at my hair but I don't  
take my hands out of my pockets to fix it. The moonlight does strange things  
to the water nearby, and I watch it play and dance. No worries, it's like a  
fairy or a child as it skips on the waves. Shaking my head, I laugh a little  
and admonish myself for flights of fancy. In truth, I am terrified Usako  
won't come to find me. She understands, I know she does, I saw it in her  
eyes after the battle, still unsure, still frightened. Usako knows I can  
still hurt her someday, could she be willing to risk that again?  
  
"Mamo-chan!"  
  
Of course. Right now, she wants to be in my arms as much as I want her  
there, and that is all that will ever matter to Usako.   
  
I raise my head and smile, she is running, out of breath, does not even  
slow down, and in seconds she has thrown thin arms around me.  
  
It has been months. Months, and how much I have forgotten, in spite of  
me. Senses reeling, I tighten my arms around her, her warmth thrumming  
through my veins. Her lungs are heaving from running, her entire form  
shaking slightly as thin arms snake their way around me. If my memories had  
for one moment given full justice to how wonderful she felt, I would not have  
been able to keep away from her for so long, there is no way. Tightening my  
arms around her, (I think for once I rival her on the strength of our hugs) I  
clutch the denim fabric of her jacket, breathe in her scent, shuddering with  
every breathe of air she exhales onto my neck. She is real, finally, her  
heart beating against mine.   
  
I brush away impossibly silky waves of hair, finally allow myself to  
look into her eyes. The gold fibers are there, woven in with the blue,  
shimmering with her happy tears. My hands tremble, I feel dizzy. She is so,  
so beautiful. Lifting her face to me, Usako's eyes slip shut. She wants me  
to kiss her? Shimatta, does she know what that will *do* to me?  
  
But I betray myself again, and bend my head toward hers. Slowly, I shut  
my eyes lean in to kiss her, like I always have before.  
  
I thought I had remembered the taste of her lips, but I was mistaken  
again, jolted and drowning. For a long, long time not another word is  
spoken, and I feel a soft déjà vu... it was always very easy to loose track  
of time and the outside world when Tsukino Usagi insists on kissing you.   
  
Finally, it is she who pulls away, and looks at me timidly. "Will I see you  
tomorrow?" she askes, slim fingers tense and clasped around my arms.   
  
I can't help a sad smile to half-way grace my face. The last time I  
kissed her like this, I left her alone again to cry. I can understand her  
need for reassurance. "I promise," I tell her, "I won't leave you alone  
anymore." And she kisses me again, struggling to keep her lips from lifting  
into a smile, and I think if someone could freeze a 'right now' let it be  
this one.  
  
"Usako," I repeat her name, reaffirming, and she answers back.  
  
I am her Mamo-chan again. Forever in this moment. For now, that is all  
I ask.  
  
  
~There is no future.  
There is no past.  
Thank God this moment's not  
The Last  
  
There's only Now  
There's only Here  
Give in to love,   
Or live in fear  
No other path, no other way  
No Day But Today.  
  
No Day But Today.~  
  
-Finale B  
RENT  
  
  
REVEIW!! 


End file.
